Hi all,
I study marsupial moles in central Australia, and I am interested the
sounds of these animals make underground and those of their food
(insects etc). Marsupial moles are true marsupials and quite
unrelated to moles in europe and north america, and they are amongst
the most elusive and poorly known mammals of the world. They are
mole-like in appearance and have a beautiful white silky fur, shovel
shaped hands and are completely blind (not even optic nerve or eye
sockets). They hardly ever come to the surface and have been rarely
recorded. Most specimens in museums have been obtained from
aboriginal people. Marsupial moles (or 'itjaritjari' the common
name, derived from pitjantjatjara) make a living foraging in the deep
sand of deserts of central australia, but virtually nothing is kbown
about their lifestyle, habits or ecology. They are also regarded as
endangered and my work is aimed at their conservation.
One of the ways i am trying to learn about itjaritjari is to listen
for them using grids of geophones. Everything itjaritjari do
underground makes some sound/vibration, and its a good bet that they
use the sounds of other animals to hunt them too as internally their
ears are well developed. We have heard itjaritjari a few times, but
the catch is that one often has to wait a long time before an
itjaritjari comes along. Currently, we are still doing the listening
manually, but we have been building semi-automatic system that will
go on and off at predetermined times. This system will be controlled
by a computer and record from up to 32 geophone channels
simultaneously (effectively) so we should be able to triangulate and
track the animals too.
Amongst all this I need to be able to make good quality recordings of
what we hear in the geophone grids (itjaritjari moving and
vocalising, insect and other potential food noises, etc). I have
been using a nagra 1/4" tape deck, but its an awkward medium and
inconvenient. I have been looking at some of the pros and cons of
replacing this with digital, but I can't really afford a DAT. So I'm
trying to decide between a portable minidisc recorder or something
like the nomad jukebox 3. However, I am a little wary of minidisc
because the compression is lossy and may miss more subtle parts of a
signal. In this regard recording undergrounds sounds as WAV files is
probably an advantage, which the jukebox does. The jukebox with 20
or 40Gb would also provide a means to download the geophone computer
in the field, and is also attractive from the point of view that it
would be easier to protect from sand in the field and boasts a 98db
signal-noise ratio.
Anyway, i don't have any experience with either of these gadgets and
could do with some advice.
cheers
joe
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Joe Benshemesh
Alice Springs, NT 0870
Email:
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